PAX 09: Pokemon Rumble Hands-On

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Yellow Pikachu needs food, badly.

By Levi Buchanan

After gamers at PAX try Pokemon Rumble, they often describe it as Pokemon-meets-Gauntlet. It's an entirely fair assessment. This action game allows up to four players to enter basic mazes with Pokemon, charged with just one mission: beat up waves of other Pokemon that roam the screen. Every so often, after dishing out a particularly savage beatdown – well, as savage as you can get with this cel-shaded, slightly super deformed art style – a fainted Pokemon can be collected.

Added to your menagerie, you can now summon the captured Pokemon into the maze at any time. However, while you may change out Pokemon at any time while active, you are only allowed three new Pokemon if your current selection faints. When playing with friends, the three faints are shared. That should make for an exciting dynamic as nobody will want to be the player that brought the whole team down with the third faint.

The PAX demo was limited to just a few areas, such as a forest, cave, and enchanted castle. There were several pre-set save files to choose form, each with different Pokemon. Once into a scene, you get an idea for just how straightforward this game is. You hammer on 1 and 2 to attack the other Pokemon with melee or limited projectiles. However, the wrinkle of Pokemon types having dominance over others comes into play here. That little Blubasaur can actually dish out quite a bit of damage against a Charizard. Against the giant Ivysaur boss at the end of the forest area? Not so much.

This was the first time I had seen Pokemon Rumble, so it was entirely new to me. I'm going to let you in on a secret here. Please don't tell Ryan Geddes, but I kind of liked what I played. As a Gauntlet fan, the concept of rushing through a maze and slapping around wave after wave of monsters appeals. And with a clever collection and move upgrade system, Pokemon Rumble actually might have a little more going on under the hood than the arcade classic.

I tried the game once by myself and once with another player. Ever play a game with somebody that bum rushes loot drops, even if he didn't kill the monster? That guy was at PAX this weekend and he Hoover'd up as many Pokemon coins as he could while I engaged the enemy Pokemon. Greed makes Pikachu cry, sir.